The Festive North focused on celebration, showcasing images of traditional and contemporary Inuit games, drum dancing, throat singing, community gatherings and feasts, quite simply all things celebratory in Inuit Art. Traditionally, the great gatherings and celebrations centred on sharing and one of the most important things shared were the games. Games played an important role in the traditional semi-nomadic lifestyle; ensuring survival they helped to improve strength, dexterity, endurance and pain resistance.
During the 1950s, the term “contemporary Inuit sculpture” was used to distinguish new work from that produced during the Prehistoric and Contact eras. Today, however, the use of this term to cover a fifty-year period has made it something of a misnomer. This exhibition focused on sculpture created over the past decade and looks at what is really “contemporary” within Inuit sculpture.
This retrospective of Edwin Holgate’s work was the first since the artist’s death in 1977. The exhibition explored many aspects of this versatile artist’s production, including early works from his Montreal and Paris training, portraits of his Montreal circle of friends and family, paintings in oil and watercolour, his work as a war artist, and prints from his trip to the Skeena River region of British Columbia.
Norval Morrisseau, also called Copper Thunderbird, rose to fame in the 1960s when he developed the unique painting style known as the Woodland School. Today this art style is called Anishnaabe painting, a reference to the artist’s heritage, and the unique pictographic style influenced many other First Nations artists. This exhibition included rarely-seen or never before displayed pieces.
This exhibition showcased some of the best-known prints from Kinngait (Cape Dorset) with a focus on selected works by Kenojuak Ashevak, Pudlo Pudlat, Parr, Pitaloosie Saila, Pauta Saila, Kananginak Pootoogook, Sheojuk Etidlooie, Kingmeata Etidlooie, Pitseolak Ashoona, Lucy Qinnuayuak, Kiakshuk, Tudlik, and many other artists.
This landmark exhibition was a retrospective of the oeuvre of Takao Tanabe, internationally renowned Vancouver Island artist, winner of the Governor General’s Award, and in 1993, recipient of the Order of British Columbia. The exhibition surveyed Tanabe’s work from the 1950s through to the early years of this century.
Art and Society included more than forty works from the collection of the National Gallery of Canada – including paintings, drawings, prints, and sculpture – looks at three generations of Canadian artists and their visions of the role of art in shaping society.
Newfoundland-based, nationally acclaimed realist painter Mary Pratt is renowned for her beautiful, sensuous still life paintings, Two of these paintings, Glassy Apples and Peach Compote, provided the inspiration for two editions of Japanese woodblock prints developed by Pratt in collaboration with Japanese master printmaker Masato Arikushi of Vancouver. These prints were the primary focus of Mary Pratt: Allusions.
The McMichael Canadian Art Collection was the premiere and only Canadian art gallery to host The Art of Robert Bateman. A native of Toronto, Robert Bateman is a name familiar to most, if not all, Canadians. Although best known around the world as a wildlife artist, Bateman’s art also encompasses other subjects – landscapes, portraits, and still lifes – each created with a careful and knowledgeable attention to the principles of composition and design. His genius lies in his ability to distil complexity into elegant simplicity thereby creating art that is accessible and enjoyable at many levels.
This exhibition featured works on paper by members of the Group of Seven who, in addition to their well-known paintings of uninhabited landscapes, also depicted scenes from local communities. Works by Lawren S. Harris, Franklin Carmichael, A.Y. Jackson and A.J. Casson representing Toronto; Cobalt, Ontario; Gaspé, Quebec, and other communities were displayed alongside information related to the artists’ experiences in working with their subjects.
Miller Brittain’s life as an artist is defined partly by the large and diverse body of drawings and paintings that trace a course of self examination, interpret the life and people around him, and probe his spiritual and emotional landscapes. Brittain (1912-1968) was a figurative artist at a time when landscape painting of the Group of Seven and their followers held sway in Canadian art.
Stones, Bones and Stitches is an exhibition of Inuit works from the McMichael Canadian Art Collection’s permanent collection based on a new publication by Tundra Books written by McMichael curators Shelley Falconer and Shawna White.
